Once upon a time the internet was seen as a haven for the socially awkward, a place where spotty, tongue-tied teens and lonely, sad-acts too-geeky-to-function could create magnificent, confident alter egos. Whilst games and networking sites like World of Warcraft and SecondLife still swing open the doors to a big virtual closet, a large proportion of online natives have cast off the pursuit of the 90s alter-ego, opting instead for amplified reality: a hyper-ego.
Social networking has fast become a mainstream social must – MySpace, Facebook, Bebo, LiveJournal. You fill in the personal information categories, upload your photos, discover which Sex & the City character you are, feel quietly chuffed when you’re voted ‘Sexiest Friend’.
You probably quite enjoy this frivolous, voyeuristic pastime – but that mirror looks both ways.
There are many facets to this issue ranging from fairly harmless Facebook-stalking by that secret crush, to more serious privacy violations such as identity theft, to the marketing river of gold that is data-mining.
Speaking with avid blogger and social network user Katy, 22 years old, in Sydney last week, TheVine asked about her privacy concerns online. “Absolutely I think about [my privacy]. Every time I create or update a profile with personal information online I consider the risks involved. It doesn't worry me, though, because with a little savviness you can avoid most of the problems associated with having personal information available and searchable via the internet…My ‘network’ is almost exclusively people I know in real life, and if a Facebook application seems to be too invasive I won't add it.”
But even a savvy user doesn’t always realise the extent of their online exposure. Adding any application on Facebook for example requires you to at the very least agree to the “know who I am and access my information” proviso. After some clicking you find that:
…information may include, without limitation…your name, your profile picture, your gender, your birthday, your hometown location (city/state/country), your current location (city/state/country), your political view, your activities, your interests, your musical preferences, television shows in which you are interested, movies in which you are interested, books in which you are interested, your favorite quotes, the text of your “About Me" section, your relationship status, your dating interests, your relationship interests, your summer plans, your Facebook user network affiliations, your education history, your work history, your course information, copies of photos in your Facebook Site photo albums, metadata associated with your Facebook Site photo albums (e.g., time of upload, album name, comments on your photos, etc.), the total number of messages sent and/or received by you, the total number of unread messages in your Facebook in-box, the total number of "pokes" you have sent and/or received, the total number of wall posts on your Wall™, a list of user IDs mapped to your Facebook friends, your social timeline, and events associated with your Facebook profile.
Remember that dream where you turn up at school naked?
One of the problems outlined by David Vaile, executive director of the Cyberspace Law Centre at UNSW, is that these programs exclude those who refuse to relinquish this information. “These sites are typically complicated, confusing, and generally opaque,” he told TheVine. “The defaults are generally set to expose everything, it’s opt-out rather than opt-in and that’s a very bad model. It should be voluntary, there should be no coercion.”
Also worrying is that there is no method of revoking information that has been disaggregated or on-sold – who hasn’t untagged an unflattering picture of themselves at the beach or at a fancy dress party? Horrifyingly, the web’s memory is not just long, it’s seemingly ever lasting. Vaile explains, “By the time you’ve exposed everything about yourself it’s very hard to get back. It’s a one-way street. It’s irrevocable.
“Personal information can have more serious financial effects than if someone got their hands on your PIN number. You might find yourself unable to get insurance, unable to get housing, unable to get a job, you might become a political suspect.”
Unlike something with an obvious cause and effect, these consequences might not even be traceable to their original online source. Once something is posted you can’t take it back – can you image being held accountable for every note you ever passed in class when you were 14, every stupid comment, every dumb prank you ever played for the rest of your life?
“There is no obligation to warn anybody,” continues Vaile, “the harm is often distant in time and place, but also the people involved have every motive to shut us out and not tell anyone about it.
“You’re basically dealing with an uninformed market, because it’s very new. It’s not like your parents would say ‘Oh, I remember when your uncle Ron lost his job because he stupidly did something on Facebook.’ Even 25-year-olds didn’t use Facebook like the people who are 15 now, so there is no social or cultural or primitive race memory, no common-sense warnings about it.”
He calls for greater transparency, revocability, and explicit agreement as a gold standard for the online networking community. “This is not a passive thing just ticking along, this is a monstrous juggernaut with a very imbalanced advertising and propaganda promotional scheme going on.”
They’re not going to give up a good thing. It might be time to wake up, chuck on that PE kit you left in your locker, and pray to Google no one caught sight of your bits along the way.
By Rachael Bolton